Such Lost Creatures
by Euphrasia
Summary: "If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice where we can't find you!" Thorki. You no like, you no read.
1. Vanishing

The energy generated by the Tesseract feels good. That's the first thought that crosses Thor's mind as he feels the powerful pull towards home. It only takes a few seconds for the cube to transport itself and its cargo across all the endless sprawl of space, but somewhere between Midgard and Asgard, Loki vanishes.

No. That's not quite right. He doesn't simply disappear; Thor feels a sudden jerk that tugs him momentarily off course. Were it not for the sheer, unadulterated power of the Tesseract snapping him back on to his planned trajectory, he would be shooting without direction into an unfamiliar field of stars off in the incomprehensible distance. A heartbeat later, his feet are on solid ground in Asgard and he is alone. It doesn't take him long to realise that whatever bumped him off course also snatched Loki away. Thor can only guess at the mysterious force's purpose.

Was it planned? Does the trickster mean to hide somewhere unreachable, lick his wounds and come back stronger, or is there something more sinister at work here? It seems that all the infinite power of the universe conspires to keep Loki from coming home.

Thor curses softly and hastens to find his father.

—

He finds Odin on his throne, flanked by trusted guards waiting to receive the Tesseract and store it safely. His voice is marked and made heavy by exhaustion as he addresses his eldest son; he knows something is amiss, and Thor judges from his expression that the news is not good. He hands over the cube with a barely spoken word of acknowledgement, and goes to his father's side.

"Thor. My son. What happened?" Odin asks. Thor knows he has no interest in what happened on Earth; he wants to know how it is that Loki has evaded justice.

"There was a… pulling," Thor replies, struggling to articulate the sensation he had felt on his brief journey home. "Where is he?"

Odin sighs and is silent for a long time.

"I cannot see him."

The knowledge hits him like a punch. As a child Loki was forever trying to disappear from their father's sight as if to avoid punishment for the mischief he so delighted in creating, but there has only ever been one time when Loki was truly hidden: after falling away in a flood of Bifrost energy, carried off so fast and far that not even the All-Father could know his location, nor his fate.

Thor bows his head.

"I… am very tired," he says at length. It's true; his wounds have sapped his strength and this new turn of events has only served to drain him further. He is utterly spent.

"Go," Odin dismisses. Father and son would both be alone in their grief. "We will talk further when you are recovered."

—

The walk to his quarters is much further than he remembers. It seems to take a very long time, and each step feels heavier than the last. He knows he ought to find the friends who have eagerly awaited his return, but he doesn't want to see them—nor anyone else, for that matter. All he wants is to sleep away the hurt, to lie in darkness and forget about all this mess.

It is bad form to ignore one's problems, he knows that too, but when he finally reaches his bed and collapses into its soft embrace sleep finds him within seconds, and what he knows doesn't matter any more. For the first time in months, he falls into a slumber so deep that no dreams disturb him, not the good dreams of better times nor the dreams where Loki is dead, where Thor screams until his throat is raw and awakens with tears drying on his face.

This time, when he awakens, it has been two days and for just a second everything feels normal and good again. The weight of all that's happened settles on him slowly, though, and everything hurts again by the time he has risen and bathed. He's sick of these people and this place, and all he wants is for someone to bring his little brother back, to mend his broken mind.

A long sigh rushes out of Thor, and he sits on the edge of his bed heavily. For a long while all he does is stare at the floor with his head in his hands, letting his thoughts wander. They never wander far; everything comes back to Loki, the colour of his eyes, the softness of his hair, the warmth of his skin… his smell, his taste, the way he's helpless to stop the colour from rushing into his face whenever Thor touches him just so… and all of this turned to ash and memories in the space of a scant few months.

If he could retreat into those memories and stay there, safe and warm, he would.

He stands and crosses the threshold, intending to visit his father, but when he reaches the door he stops and turns back. On a shelf above his bed, a pendant glitters in the warm light. A gift, one he hasn't worn since before his banishment. Just touching it brings back a warm flood of bittersweet memories. Loki made it, years ago, vying for attention after Thor received Mjölnir—a birthday present and show of fealty from the dwarves. Thor smiles, even as he feels sadness swell in his heart, at the memory of how taken with the blacksmith he had been in the weeks that followed. During that time Loki had acted out worse than ever, and finally, after an untold number of increasingly cruel pranks against members of the court, he had confronted Thor, close to tears, with the necklace clutched in his white fist.

"_You're obsessed, Thor," he said softly, with the ghost of a sad smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. He had never been handsome as a child, or strong, but as he neared adulthood he had grown into features that had made him seem gaunt and sickly throughout youth. At sixteen, he was attractive in a sinewy sort of way, like something predatory._

_It was his face that made him beautiful in Thor's eyes, the sharp contours, the sweeping arch of lips designed for smirking, those wide, beseeching eyes. In the light of the torches in Thor's quarters, shadows flickered and melted across his pale face; light glistened in the tears gathering in his lashes. _

"_I'm not—" Thor began, but Loki cut him off with a humourless laugh._

"_Well you don't have time for me anymore, regardless of whether or not you're obsessed—which you absolutely are," he replied, chewing on his bottom lip in that way he always did when he was trying not to cry. "It's always you and Sindri now." _

_Thor frowned, intending to argue, but seeing his brother's chin dimple as the tears came ever closer made him reconsider. He stood in awkward silence instead, and then took a step forward, meaning to hold his brother and kiss away those tears before they fell. Loki stepped back, though, and swatted angrily at his eyes with the back of his hand._

"_Loki… don't be like that."_

_The look Loki shot him then was poison, even behind a sheen of tears. He thrust his fist at Thor's face and made him recoil, raising a hand in defence, but then the older boy saw the pale glint of silver in the firelight._

"_I made this for you," Loki spat. "It's not as good as your stupid hammer, but when you wear it—" he faltered, and Thor reached out a tentative hand to take the necklace, and to give his little brother time to find his voice again. "When you wear it you'll always know what I'm feeling."_

_He stormed off then, leaving Thor to stare after him with the delicate length of slender silver chain in his hand, palm curled around the roughly shaped bead of blue tourmaline at its end and a nagging guilt working into his heart._

A great sadness settles on Thor as he stands watching morning rise over Asgard, still holding on to the necklace. It's been years since last he wore it, but he slips it on over his head now, not expecting to feel anything but still a little disappointed when the negligible weight settles around his neck and all he feels is a slight chill where the cold metal touches his bare skin. He tucks it under his armour anyway, and steels himself for the inevitable meeting with the All-Father.

He suspects he knows what's going to happen. It's been two days and nobody has come to rouse him from his sleep, so there is no news. Dead or alive, his father would have sent someone if Loki had been found. That leaves only one option for Thor, which Odin will present to him in no uncertain terms: move on, try to forget, know that Loki may come back in his own time. Thor already knows in his heart that this is what he must do, but hearing it from somebody else will be another difficult burden to bear.

The walk back to the throne room is lonely, and seems to take a very long time.


	2. Underdog

**A/N: **I wasn't going to write this chapter. Wanted to leave you guessing... but then I wrote it anyway! So here it is.

* * *

The stars are hard and unblinking. They cast a cold light. Loki surveys the grey, airless landscape with just his eyes, not daring to move his head; he feels a malicious presence close behind him, and some childish part of him hopes beyond hope that it will disappear if only he doesn't acknowledge it.

It does not.

"You have _failed_ us," a voice hisses into his ear. He shudders. Even if it weren't for the muzzle clamping his jaw shut, Loki would have been powerless to respond. What would he say? _Yes, I have failed in this endeavour, as in every other. Perhaps you ought to take your grievances up with Thor. Were it not for him blocking me at every turn, you would have your precious Tesseract._

"So quick to pass the burden of blame…" the voice goes on as if in response, chiding, and Loki is suddenly aware of a presence in his head, probing amongst his memories, his thoughts. He turns his head slightly, sharply, but when the robed grey thing appears in the peripherals of his vision he realises that he doesn't _want _to look upon this awful creature. His chest heaves with the unattainable desire to speak, to force this other out of his mind.

A thick, clammy hand settles on the back of his neck, and Loki flinches away… but the hand stays, heavy and cool, sending shivers of disgust down his spine. It touches the place at the nape of his neck where the clasp of his muzzle is, and a second later the metal contraption drops away, unclasped.

The robed creature's touch turns to an iron grip, driving Loki down to his knees. The damp lips of a mouth filled with too many teeth brush against his ear as the other sneers an explanation against the back of his head.

"We would hear you _scream_, little prince."

Fear stabs at the heart of him, and for a second his lips move soundlessly as he tries and fails to think of something clever to say. He settles instead for staring down at his half-clenched hands, wondering how it's come to this, vulnerable and utterly alone in the white light of unfamiliar constellations, beyond help, beyond anything but hoping for the small mercy of a quick death.

He bows his head, closes his eyes and promises himself that the Tesseract will not be the only thing he denies them. He won't scream for them, either.

The crack of a whip breaks the breathless silence. Loki's eyes snap open and for a second he cannot even process the fact that the pain blooming like baleful flowers across his shoulder-blades is _real_. He tries to stand only to discover that his wrists are no longer manacled together; they're chained to the ground, and he cannot rise.

Confusion crosses his face for just heartbeat, then the whip cracks again. This time the pain is immediate and terrible, and Loki breaks his promise. He jerks against his restraints and _screams_, and when the lash comes down a third time he knows already that he can take no more. There are shards of bone tied to the ends of the whip and they tear through fabric and skin and muscle like a knife through butter. The fourth lash rips a chunk of flesh out of the small of his back and he feels hot bile rise in his throat; by the time the whip comes down a seventh—eight, ninth?—time he's emptied the watery contents of his stomach all over his knees and he's sobbing, writhing, desperately trying to twist away from the pain but finding no reprieve.

He screams and screams, apologises, _begs_, but his words fall on deaf ears so all he can do is scream more, scream and sob and choke until he can taste blood.

Twenty times the lash snaps across his back, and when it finally stops an eternity has passed and Loki has screamed his throat raw. He kneels, sobbing, broken, in a spreading pool of his own blood and vomit. His stomach is empty but he retches anyway, and spits a bloody stream of saliva, and trembles.

From somewhere far-off and unimportant he hears chuckling laughter.

"So weak." He doesn't know if someone's talking or if he's just imagining it, if it's his own voice mocking him from some safe corner of his mind where the pain can't reach. "_Pathetic_."

The edges of his vision fade, and he slumps down to the ground. Every movement sends barbs of pain lancing through his torso, electric jolts that are the only connection he has to consciousness. When at last he is still and the pain expands into an all-encompassing ache, he feels his awareness ebbing away. Just before he slips away into a grey and formless field of unconsciousness, he confronts the thought that the worst has yet to come, and the barest whimper escapes him unbidden… and then darkness, blessed darkness, rolls over him like a wave.


	3. Whereabouts Unknown

**A/N: **I would have published this yesterday but an unfortunate time-guzzler called Minecraft 360 appeared on my radar and I found myself playing it for pretty much the whole day. Anyway, thanks everyone for all your feedback! Enjoy.

* * *

His father isn't in the throne room, but his mother is. She smiles wanly as he approaches and Thor is struck by how unwell these last few days have left her looking, as if staying strong has drained so much of her vigour that she can barely find the energy to hold herself together any more. Of course, she is Frigga, wife of Odin, and she looks as composed and regal as ever, but there are dark shadows around her eyes like bruises and she is pale, terribly pale. All of her motions have a slow, pre-meditated quality as though she is afraid that any sudden movements will shatter the bubble of serene, numb peace she has built around herself.

Thor doesn't know how to console her. An embrace is only scant comfort for a woman who has twice seen her youngest son snatched cruelly away from her, but it's all he can offer, and she seems grateful for it. She clings on with a ferocity that surprises him, and is obviously hesitant let go. Maybe she hopes that if she holds on tight enough she'll never lose Thor the same way she has lost Loki—figuratively, to some festering darkness in his mind, and literally to some faraway place that has severed her connection to him more completely even than death.

She holds him at arms length and studies his face, and nods as if affirming some secret thought.

"You're looking for your father," Frigga says. Thor nods, but when his mother begins to gesture towards the door he catches her hand in both of his own to cut her off. He _is _looking for his father, but he's not in such a rush that he hasn't noticed the impossible, infinite sadness in his mother's voice. He's _worried_ for her.

"Are you alright, mother?" he asks, and it's a stupid question that he hates himself for asking. The sad smile on her face is one of gratitude, though.

"This is not the first time I have lost a son," she replies. Thor isn't sure whether he should take that to mean she knows how to cope with this grief or that she curses whatever force sees fit to rob a mother of her children. An evasive answer, a politician's answer… but he knows better than to press, and when Frigga leans up to kiss his cheek he holds her close.

"I will bring him home, mother. I swore it once, and I would swear it again. Do not despair."

For a second, her composure falters and she looks like she might cry. She doubts him, and he doesn't blame her; he has already failed once, and time is running out for Loki. Can a man who has no interest left in seeking redemption really be saved? Frigga steels herself and forces a smile.

"Your father is in the armoury. There is something… _amiss_ with the artefact you bought back with you."

As Thor goes to leave, she calls after him.

"Don't put yourself in undue danger, Thor. I couldn't stand to lose you as well."

It grieves him that his mother acts as if Loki is gone forever. Perhaps it makes the pain easier to bear. Perhaps this way it won't destroy her if the next time she sees her youngest son he's burning up on a funeral pure, if all she has left of him is ash and a grassy memorial stone somewhere outside Asgard.

—

It's cool in the armoury, and quiet. Thor takes a slow walk in the company of his memories, remembering the times spent down here with Loki while their father regaled them with tales of conquest. He also remembers fragments of an argument with Loki over the suitability of a gift so personal as the necklace.

"_I can't accept this, Loki. If you want me to know what you're thinking, _tell me_," Thor said, with the charm still clutched in his hand. "It wouldn't be fair on you, not being able to have secrets or—"_

"_Ah, yes… I am, after all, the great keeper of secrets. The _liar_. Where would I be without my deceits?" Loki spat in return, arms folded, eyes narrowed._

"_You know that's not what I meant…"_

"_Oh? And what _did _you mean?"_

"_If you want me to know how you're feeling, just tell me. You—"_

"_Just tell you?" Loki repeated, sounding incredulous. "Perhaps if you could peel your attention away from your dwarf friend for long enough to acknowledge my existence—"_

"_Am I not allowed other friends, Loki?" Thor shouted in return, beginning to get angry now at his brother's knack for playing the martyr. "You are not the only person in all of Asgard who I desire to spend time with!"_

"_No, I'm the only person in Asgard who you desire to avoid."_

"_Oh, Loki, _stop_. Given the choice between Sindri and you I would choose you every time, and you _know_ it. You're being pathetic." Loki looked at him then with poison in his eyes, and Thor sighed. "I am sorry, little brother. I didn't—"_

"_No," Loki replied shortly. "You're right, anyway. You don't need the necklace to know how I'm feeling; I can show you."_

The argument had, as he recalls, culminated in Thor being shoved up against the wall with Loki's fingers curled into his hair, the younger man breathing heavily into his ear as he thrust himself into Thor with relentless strokes. He had borne the reminders of that encounter for weeks, bite-marks across his neck and shoulders, a criss-crossed network of bloody gouges left by Loki's nails covering his torso and, much to his chagrin, a great deal of discomfort every time he sat down.

Apparently, Loki had been feeling angry.

Thor smiles as he walks, remembering the sense of vague and constant fear that all the noise and commotion would attract the guards. He still doesn't know if it was luck that kept them undiscovered, or if Loki had wrought some trickery, some magic to keep the guards' attention elsewhere.

He misses those days, yearns for them with all his heart, but he knows that even if he _does_ ever succeed in bringing Loki back home, things can never be the way they were before.

When he reaches the Tesseract, he becomes suddenly aware of a shift in temperature. It's warmer in this far end of the armoury, almost stiflingly so. Just walking to stand beside his father breaks him out in a sweat, and he can see that the heat is making Odin irritable. He only gives his father a sidelong glance, though, and in return the All-Father makes a barely audible noise of acknowledgement. His attention, and Thor's, is fixed on the cube in its enchanted glass container.

It is, Thor thinks, a good job that the vessel is layered with magic or else the power of the Tesseract would have shattered it. He can barely see the cube for all the energy trembling around it, blue streaked with black and white, as if someone has unleashed a violent electrical storm and compressed it down into the glass. In the maelstrom he thinks he catches a glimpse of familiar blue eyes, but perhaps that's just wishful thinking.

"What is happening?" Thor asks, eyes narrowed slightly against the glare. Odin is thoughtfully silent for a moment before offering a carefully measured response.

"Someone… or something… has homed in on the Tesseract—from somewhere _outside_ of the Nine Realms—and seems to be trying to send a message."

"Loki?" Thor asks immediately, sounding like a hopeful child. He expects his father to shake his head, but instead he nods very slowly as if turning the possibility over in his mind.

"Perhaps," he admits. Thor brightens. At last, a chance to find his brother. At last, a chance to bring him _home_. Odin notices the expression on Thor's face and puts a comforting hand on his son's forearm. "Do not get your hopes up, my son. It may prove to be a trick. It may not be Loki at all."

"How do we find out?" Thor asks, barely registering the possibility that Loki isn't the one trying to reach through.

"We let the portal open," Odin replies at length. Now as ever, his eldest son's eagerness to leap headfirst into the unknown troubles him. "It will be no mean feat," he adds by way of warning. "The Tesseract is powerful. If I am to harness its power, that will be _all _I can do. You will have to go through the portal alone. I do not think it possible to open the portal _and_ admit more than one person to the other side." He is silent for a moment, but Thor senses that there is more, and waits.

He is rewarded with a long sigh from the All-Father, who turns to look at him with the faint glimmer of hope lending light to his good eye.

"Particularly not if Loki_ is_ on the other side. He will need to be brought back, after all."


	4. Little Lion Man

**A/N: **High-five for vague allusions to Norse mythology!

* * *

When he comes to, the landscape has changed and he doesn't remember where he is. All he knows is that he is sat somewhere cold and grey, with his arms chained up above his head and pain needling through his torso every time he moves. It's the pain that brings him back to himself, reminds him of how he got here. The knowledge does little to assuage his fear.

And he _is_ afraid. He's never been so scared, not even hanging over the abyss and knowing he's going to let himself fall.

He jumps as something moves above him, sending grit skittering down the rock face he is shackled to. When he looks up, he sees nothing but the black sky and a delirious sprawl of stars… but he is filled with foreboding and a sense of being watched. He knows that they aren't finished with him yet. They wouldn't have left him here, naked and vulnerable as a babe, if there wasn't worse to come.

After scanning the area above him one more time, he lets his head drop back down—and makes a startled, strangled noise as his eyes settle on what's surely the biggest serpent he's ever seen coiling itself lazily around a pile of rocks a few yards away from him. He draws his knees instinctively up to his chest, trying to distance himself, and watches the slow-moving snake with big eyes, pain forgotten, scarcely daring to breathe.

The serpent seems content to watch, tongue flickering out occasionally as if it relishes the taste of Loki's fear. For several seconds they only stare at one another, until a voice breaks the silence and his eyes dart to the source of the unexpected sound. The snake, he senses, continues to watch him steadily.

The speaker is a familiar, unwelcome sight, swaddled in grey robes, smirking a grey smirk. Loki tastes bile, feels his chest tighten in dreadful anticipation. Pale light glints off the metal muzzle in his tormentor's hand, and Loki shakes his head just barely.

"Don't—" he begins, voice raw. Have they not shamed him sufficiently?

"Don't?" the Chitauri repeats, sounding amused. "You are in no position to be giving _orders_," it observes, but it studies the muzzle for a moment and then makes a faint noise as if to indicate agreement.

Loki wets his lips as the other draws closer. His eyes don't leave the muzzle until the last minute, when he looks up sharply.

"Please," he says softly, in a voice that_ tries_ to sound measured and reasonable, "I can get you the Tesseract." He can. He _knows _he can. Even from Asgard, across all of time and space, the cube still emits a magnetic energy that he is drawn to, that he can feel, that he could use if only it weren't for—

The Chitauri strikes him, lashing out suddenly and catching the side of his face with the muzzle. It leaves a gouge across his cheek and jaw that he can feel bleeding before he's even registered the fact that it hurt. He grimaces and falls silent, looking pointedly at the ground until he feels a clammy hand grab his chin and jerk his head up so his eyes are level with the vicious set of teeth sneering down at him.

"You have failed us once, _Loki Odinson_. We do not forgive such incompetence so easily. You do not get another chance; you will pay your penance, and then you will die."

The snake, half forgotten, stirs. Loki turns his head to look, and regrets doing so immediately as it spits venom across the distance between them. He doesn't know whether it's by coincidence or design that the toxic liquid strikes him in the eyes. He doesn't care. The pain of the scourging pales into utter insignificance; t_his_ pain is such that he can't even scream, can't articulate anything more than faint, desperate noises as he thrashes with all his might against the chains restraining him, wanting only to rid himself of this searing, white-hot agony.

Blessedly, it fades quickly to a dull stinging around his eyes; blessedly, he can still see, though his eyes are half gummed together by the drying venom, half blind with tears. He gasps and sobs, and then is denied even that small release as the muzzle clamps down over his mouth, silencing him.

All he can cling to is the desperate hope that perhaps if he can reach out to the Tesseract, to Asgard, maybe—just maybe—they'll come for him. Even as he sees the serpent uncoil itself from the rocks and come slowly sliding closer, he casts around with his mind, reaching out for the thrumming energy of the cube. By the time he finds it the snake is alongside him, rearing up, ready to strike.

He has just enough time to glimpse, in his mind's eye, familiar surroundings. _Asgard_. In the split-second before the snake latches on to his hip and pumps him full of liquid fire, he sees Thor's face and thinks—hopes—he catches a hint of recognition in his once-brother's eyes. _Save me_.

Then there's just impossible, appalling pain, from which, for all his writhing, there is no release.


	5. Out of Reach

There is something striking about the portal that springs open the second Odin lets it. It is at once beautiful and terrible, and it charges the armoury with electricity that makes the assembled guards shift uncomfortably. Thor can't blame them for being uncomfortable. It is perhaps rash to open a strange portal to an unknown dimension while all of Asgard continues its business, unaware of the potential danger opening up beneath their feet.

His grip on Mjölnir is iron, and tightens further as they wait in breathless silence to see if anything will come through from the other side. Personally, Thor sees nothing. He sees stars and a lifeless grey expanse of hills, and no signs of life. He is eager to venture through, but he has learned the merits of patience and so awaits permission from the All-Father. Odin seems deep in concentration; Thor can see that it is a struggle for him to keep a grasp on the portal, keep it open and stable.

"Go," his father says at last. The look of concentration on his face is replaced with a look that very much seems to be _daring _the portal to have the audacity to close. "You will not have long. Do not delay, do not put yourself in danger."

Thor nods, steels himself, and walks with long, purposeful strides through the portal. He expects it to put up some kind of resistance, braces himself for a wall of energy trying to keep him out, but he passes through with surprising ease and when the ground beneath his feet turns grey and barren he stops to survey the landscape.

Abruptly, he feels afraid. Something close to panic comes clawing up his throat and he comes within a heartbeat of bolting, fleeing back through the portal like a coward, but he realises, as fear constricts his throat and makes it hard to breathe, that the fear is not his. It's there inside him, but he is detached from it; it is not a part of him, and as soon as he comes to term with that, he distances himself and takes a breath to still his pounding heart.

Strange.

As he calms himself, he becomes slowly aware of some sound echoing up to him from amidst the rocks beneath him. Screaming, he realises, somewhere in the valley below. It's awful, makes his blood curdle, and it's made worse when he realises he _recognises_ that voice.

He doesn't know what comes first, the anger or the nausea. All he knows is that he's in the valley within a matter of seconds, Mjölnir raised ready to cave in the skull of the first living things he encounters—but the first living thing he encounters is Loki, and all the strength goes out of him, and the hammer nearly slips from his nerveless fingers.

He's a mess, riddled with what look to be bite marks, covered in streaks of blood. One side of his face is inflamed and bloody, and his head is thrown back and he's screaming, a terrible, unwholesome keening that makes Thor want nothing more than to find the person responsible for this and _break_ them.

In that moment he forgets all the evil Loki and, doggedly ignoring the voice in the back of his head telling him to proceed with caution, goes to him.

"Loki," he chokes, dropping to his knees beside him, reaching out.

The instant his fingers brush against Loki's skin the illusion crumbles away and he is left in ringing silence with his hands full of ash. For a heartbeat, he's confused, and looks down at the greasy greyness sifting through his fingers uncomprehending. Then he hears a voice behind him and he's on his feet, turning in the same fluid motion, drawing Mjölnir up out of the dirt and back into his waiting hand.

"So easily deceived," the voice says. It belongs to a man—Chitauri, he realises—cloaked and hooded, occupying a slightly elevated sprawl of rock that had been empty seconds ago. Thor registers its existence, and then his eyes are drawn down to the pitiable, chained thing crawling beside it. The Chitauri yanks it up to its feet, and in the same instant Thor realises that_ this_ is Loki, collared and muzzled like some animal, barely strong enough to support his own weight. Wisely, his captor has a knife at his throat. Were it not for that unspoken threat, the robed figure would be a smear of blood in the gravel and Thor and Loki would be back in Asgard by now.

He meets his brother's eyes, but only for a second before Loki looks away. Thor feels shame wash over him, but it's shame that has the same distant, dreamlike quality of the fear that he had felt on stepping across the threshold of the portal. The charm, he realises suddenly. Loki's charm. _When you wear it you'll always know what I'm feeling._

"Behind his back, his _friends_ call him trickster… but he is no less easily manipulated than you, Asgardian," the creature holding Loki sneers, forcing him down to his knees and grabbing a handful of his hair, the better to expose his throat. Thor doesn't move, though every inch of him thrums with the suppressed desire to close the distance between them and show the Chitauri just what a catastrophic mistake it has made in choosing to tangle with Asgard.

"What better bait than Odin All-Father's beleaguered son, his stray lamb?" it goes on, ever derisive, and Thor decides he is tired of listening.

"Enough! Why have you lured me here?" It pains him somewhat to think that he has been so easily tricked into coming here, and forces him to admit that Odin—though a wise and just king—is first and foremost a grieving father, his judgement clouded.

"A simple exchange. We require the Tesseract. You will bring it to us, and in exchange, we will end this _pitiful_ creature's suffering."

"You mean to kill him?" Thor asks, fighting with everything he has to keep his voice from breaking. The Chitauri nods slowly.

"These are our terms," it begins, but the anger that has been bubbling just beneath the surface breaks out suddenly, and Thor interjects, voice steady and certain and heavy with the promise that these are not empty threats he makes now.

"No. Mark my words, _creature_, and mark them well. I will return with the might of Asgard at my back, and you will regret ever drawing breath. We will afford you no compassion, no mercy, and you will yearn for death _long_ before death finds you. These are _my_ terms."

Something that might be a smile breaks out across the reptilian creature's face.

"The portal falters. Run home, Asgardian, but do not delay in bringing us what we require."

Thor weighs up the odds. If he rushes the Chitauri now, will he reach Loki in time to save him or will it prove his undoing? The blade at his throat glitters maliciously in the half-light and Thor is forced to admit that there can be no rescue now, that an attack would culminate only in Loki bleeding out in his arms… and he hasn't come this far to just give up on his brother like that.

Heart heavy with regret and anger, Thor starts back towards the portal, mouth set in a grim, determined line. He doesn't look back, but even so, just as he steps back through the wavering portal and into the armoury in Asgard, he catches a snatch of Loki's thoughts. If the portal hadn't snapped shut behind him he would have returned, consequences be damned, to bring his righteous anger down upon that miserable spit of land, to destroy everything and all that those monsters hold dear.

_Don't leave, don't leave me here, please, please don't, don't, I can't— please—_


	6. Going Under

Thor doesn't return with an army. He doesn't return at all. Loki spits blood and wonders why he's surprised, why he thought the All-Father would risk war for the sake of a son who has so frequently and thoroughly disappointed him.

He notices, though, that his captor seems rattled.

The Chitauri are not afraid of Thor and his hollow threats, but it seems that they are most certainly afraid of _something_. This is the first indication he's had that his gaoler is not their leader. The realisation does nothing to help him. It only twists in his guts and festers there, the thought that he is not even deemed worthy of their leader's attention.

They have called the serpent off. Loki is only half grateful for the reprieve. He suspects they have done so for fear of killing him and robbing their people of an execution. Death now seems welcome. He hurts right through to the contorted, writhing black thing that was once his soul, hurts in ways he never thought possible.

He is a shadow, a broken, useless thing.

There is release in unconsciousness, but that is too great a show of mercy, it seems. The hooded Chitauri returns periodically, lurks around the edges of his vision, and finds ways of keeping him awake if he is deemed too close to sleep. Loki doesn't know what the criteria are. Perhaps there aren't any, perhaps the Chitauri just likes the way the bones in Loki's fingers feel when they snap.

His cries have an obligatory quality now. His throat is too bloody to sustain more than the occasional hoarse yelp, muffled by the muzzle they insist on forcing him to wear.

He senses his captor's growing disappointment that they are running out of ways to hurt him.


	7. Gifts and Curses

**A/N: **Lots of dialogue in this one. I hate dialogue. I JUST WANT TO WRITE THOR SMASHING THINGS WITH HIS HAMMER.

* * *

The argument is not going in Thor's favour. Odin is on his feet, a pillar of barely suppressed anger, and of anguish; Thor is pacing like something predatory, hungry for the devastation of the kill… and between them, Frigga sits in ghostly silence, hands folded neatly on the table.

For all their shouting, she remains unmoved, like a pale statue. Thor regrets telling her what he has seen.

"We cannot risk another war," Odin says for the hundredth time, the thousandth, and Thor feels strongly compelled to just shake him until he sees sense.

"They have already declared war, father. They have your _son_. They mean to kill him, and they do _not _mean to make it an easy death."

"Loki is beyond our reach now," his father replies. It's difficult for him to say… and it _should_ be, because it's a lie.

"Do you care for him so _little_? If you could see what they have done to him—what they are doing to him _still_, while we bandy useless words…"

How long has it been now? How many hours have dragged by? Loki's chances of survival grow ever slimmer with each second that passes.

"I cannot jeopardise the Nine Realms and all their people for one man. I cannot." Odin's voice seems to grow ever quieter as he talks, small and faint. "Being king means making hard decisions, Thor. You _must_ understand that."

"You are not making a _hard_ decision; you are making a _wrong_ decision, a foolish, _cowardly_ decision because you feel you must reconcile with yourself for letting them trick us."

"Enough!" Odin roars across the table, all the strength suddenly rushing back into his voice. Thor knows and doesn't care that he's gone too far. "We cannot save Loki and keep this fragile peace. _We cannot have both_. We can have countless millions of deaths, or one. The one will be harder to bear, but it is the right thing to do. _Selfishness_ achieves nothing, Thor. _Nothing_.

We cannot bargain with them. If we let the Tesseract fall into their hands, Migard is _lost_—and how long then until they set their sights on Asgard?"

Thor doesn't want to bargain. What he wants is to tear them—_all of them_—limb from limb, to rain lightning and death down on their heads. He would give them the Tesseract in a heartbeat if it meant a chance at saving Loki. Let them have their cube, their power. What hope have they otherwise against all the assembled fury of Asgard, and of Earth's Avengers? Thor has seen the ease with which they fall, how a single hard strike at their centre brings them apart like so much sand.

Bitter, familiar words threaten to burst from his mouth—_You are an old man and a fool!_—and Thor is force to beat a hasty retreat from the hall for fear of saying something he regrets.

—

Hours later, it's Frigga who finds him still pacing away his useless, impotent fury in the armoury. She doesn't say anything, only breezes past him, takes the Tesseract in both hands and holds it up to the light for a moment. She studies it as Thor watches her, wondering what she means to do.

Maintaining her silence, she presses the cube into his hands

"I know you love Loki," she says softly a moment later, "but you can never, _never_ understand the blessing—the curse—that is a mother's love, Thor." She smiles, strokes his face, looks at him with such adoration that he can scarcely bear it. "Sometimes I… I just have to _think_… and I can't _breathe _for love of both of you."

Her lips move soundlessly, tears swim in her eyes, and she shakes her head. Then Thor is in her arms and she is holding on to him with such intense, fierce affection that it's all he can do to put his arms around her and murmur a fervent promise into her ear.

"I will not let you down this time, mother."

She distances herself then, holds him at arms length.

"You never did."

The whole room still hums with the residual energy from the portal. Frigga reaches out a hand, finds the place where the rift was, and opens it back up with such ease that Thor gives her a questioning look, wondering why it was so difficult for the All-Father but so easy for her. She smiles a secretive smile.

"_This_ doorway is of my own making," she explains. Then she reaches out, and takes the necklace from around Thor's neck. She knows its purpose, knows that it will not serve him well on the other side. "I will look after this, until you return. Go, now, before your father tries to stop us."

He nods his gratitude, kisses his mother's forehead, and for a second time steps through the portal to Loki, this time with the Tesseract humming in his hands.


	8. The Good Left Undone

When the Chitauri returns for a final time, Loki expects another broken finger. He can't seem to muster the strength to care. One hand already lays mangled and useless in his lap, and when he looks down at it he thinks distantly that maybe he ought to feel sick or scared… but he doesn't. He doesn't _feel_ anything except a nagging ache that seems to exist only to remind him that there's still life in him somewhere.

He _can _find the strength to smile a red-toothed smile, though, and something that passes for a laugh bursts out of his mouth. The accompanying spray of blood is caught by his muzzle. _Here we are again. They call this déjà vu in Midgard. _He even deigns to straighten the fingers of the hand that's still shackled above him, to make it easier for the Chitauri to decide which one it wants to break… but when the robed, thick-fingered hand of his tormentor reaches out, it is to open the cuff around Loki's wrist and remove the muzzle from his face.

Strange. He wonders if this is the end.

There's blood smeared across his chin, around his mouth. He can feel it now. Dimly, he thinks that he must look terrible, but then the Chitauri hauls him up to his feet, jerking his broken fingers so that red lines of pain sear across his mind and he forgets what he was thinking about before.

The very act of standing seems to have drained him of all his energy. Leaning against his captor for support is abhorrent, but he just can't stand on his own. His armour weighs him down terribly. It registers in his head that he wasn't _wearing_ armour until some time in the last few seconds, and he wonders what the occasion is—which makes him laugh, a terrible, wheezing noise that leaves him doubled over and clinging to the Chitauri's robes with his good hand, lest he fall.

His lungs are on _fire_.

When he is recovered, he straightens slowly, laboriously… and sees Thor.

That, he decides, doesn't make sense. Thor didn't come back. He remembers, he _remembers_, Thor promised he would return with an army and then he didn't come back at all. A hallucination, then, a fever dream birthed by a mind poised constantly on the brink, ready to snap at the next provocation… a mind that knows it's time to die soon.

Still, Loki is pleased. He's missed Thor, through all this. It's nice to see him again before the end, even if it's not really him.

He realises after a second that his dream-Thor is talking.

"You'll get the Tesseract after you release him," he's saying, and Loki is puzzled. His bemusement, however, does not last long.

"Release him?" the Chitauri repeats. It laughs. Loki is vaguely disgusted by the noise. "As you wish."

While he is still trying to make sense of the situation, the haze he's been stumbling through for the last day lifts suddenly as a knife slides between his ribs without warning or fanfare.

It _hurts_, but it's a different kind of hurt to all the rest, an ache that's warm and almost pleasant, burning in his chest and throat the way air does after a long run, an exertion.

Still, his eyes widen and he drops to his knees, and suddenly his mouth is full of blood. He coughs, spits, but there's so much…

From a hundred, hundred miles away, he hears Thor screaming. When he looks up and his wide eyes meet with his brother's and all he sees there is hideous, terrible anguish, he is reminded of the last time their eyes met like this with Loki falling, fading…

There seem to be Chitauri everywhere. Where did they come from? Were they here the whole time? Thor is swamped. It makes Loki a little angry—_mine, you can't… only me—_but emotions don't seem to make much sense any more. Nothing does. All he can really comprehend is the red taste of blood, and the terrible cold.

He falls back and the blood pools in his throat and he can't breathe. Someone is making awful, guttering noises and he supposes it must be him, like a candle flame drowning in its own molten wax.

The last thing he sees before he slips under is the stars and their perfect geometry, their heartbreaking beauty. Some far-away part of him feels the faint trace of a tear rolling through all the grime and blood on his face… and then there's nothing.

_At last_.

* * *

**A/N: **I am a bad person. Just literally terrible right through to my core. I can't take it back, I can only apologise for what I've done (and also for the way every chapter gets shorter than the last).


	9. All Again For You

**A/N: **I've read this over a hundred times and I still can't get it sounding right. Therefore, because I'm a quitter, I'm just going to placate you with the promise that the next chapters will be better!

Also, thanks to Moonphase 9 for pointing out a booboo.

* * *

It seems that the Chitauri have been expecting him. At first, they seem afraid to venture too close, but as Thor puts ever-increasing distance between himself and the portal they drift closer, emboldened by the distance between the Asgardian and his allies. He acknowledges them at a cursory level, registering their presence and estimating their numbers at the back of his head as he's been trained to do when in enemy territory.

His attention is not on the scouts; the one he is interested looms behind Loki at the foot of the slope leading down from the portal, sinister, like a shadow. For and instant Thor allows himself to think that Loki looks a little better now, on his feet, in full regalia… but then his brother doubles over in what looks to be a fit of coughing, and when he looks back up and their eyes there's only the faintest suggestion of recognition there, and he doesn't look better at all. He's so pale, his skin mottled grey and white, _bruised_, bloody…

"A mother's love," the Chitauri stood behind his brother says suddenly in the jarring voice that so grates on Thor. "How _sentimental_."

Thor's mind flashes back to the Manhattan rooftop, the chaos, and Loki's warmth against him… the knife sliding through his armour, the _smirk_, the word '_Sentiment' _hissed into his ear like poison.

The robed figure laughs. Thor is only aware of the alien presence in his head, in his thoughts, as it withdraws and leaves a tangible sense of emptiness in the spaces it once occupied.

He is no mood for mind games, and so he presents the situation to all the gathered Chitauri—including the one he takes to be their leader—in no uncertain terms.

"You'll get the Tesseract when you release him," he says, holding the cube protectively close to his chest. Too late he realises his mistake, and by then the Chitauri are upon him. Time goes slow, liquid, dreamlike as he glimpses the pale white flash of a wickedly curved blade sliding inch by excruciating inch into the vulnerable space between Loki's ribs. He tries to scream a warning but it's already too late, there's already that look of shocked, wounded pride on Loki's face like he doesn't understand why these vile beings won't stop hurting him.

Clawed hands snatch at Thor, scrabbling for purchase on the Tesseract. Once he realises that's what they're after, he lets it go, and suddenly time is flowing as normal and Mjölnir is in his hand and still the Chitauri clutch at him like they're trying to drag him down into the soil. Just for a second, he lets them. The pressure crushes and aches and feels _good_, and then he swings the hammer and he's free of them, and there's something that might be surprise beneath the hood of the _murderer_ who stands and gloats as blood bubbles up out of Loki's mouth like some grotesquely nightmarish fountain.

Thor crashes into the Chitauri's leader and they go down in a cloud of dust, and Thor's hand closes around the reptilian thing's throat. He brings Mjölnir down in a vicious arc and reduces the creature to a headless mass of twitching limbs. For all they allege their superiority, the Chitauri die just as easily as a human might, and with less dignity.

He snarls down at the black mess he's made, still hot and trembling with anger—anger that drains out of him and leaves a void that fills with tremulous hope as he crawls on hands and knees to Loki. _Don't. Don't be dead. Just… just don't. Please._

No. Not dead, not yet. Fading, and fast, but still some determined, primal part of him clings tenaciously to life. He needs Asgard and he needs it now, but it's so far back to the portal and the Chitauri have Thor pinned, all of them eager to avenge their fallen leader.

He makes a noise somewhere between a laugh and a growl, an animal noise that comes right from the depths of his chest, the place where his heart has been bruised and broken—twice, thrice… and never again.

Thor makes a noise somewhere between a laugh and a snarl; he will give them vengeance.

A sweeping headcount tells him that two dozen soldiers remain. He doesn't like those odds, but he's faced worse.

They shout and whoop, and it seems that they might be forming some kind of attack plan. Thor stands slowly as they begin to gather together, perhaps intending to overwhelm him. He doesn't take the time to find out what their plan is, only flexes his knuckles, familiarises himself again with the leaden weight of Mjölnir in his hand, and swiftly closes the distance between himself and the nearest Chitauri.

The reptile doesn't even have time enough to scream. Thor brings the hammer down, crushes the soldier's head into the dirt, and swings back up into the belly of his next target, shattering ribs and internal organs with such devastating force that a sticky mess explodes out of the Chitauri's back and splashes, tar-like and oily, across Thor's face.

Good. There's no more savage, terrifying war-paint than the liquefied guts of your enemy.

His sudden, shattering arrival scatters them. They've never faced anything like this before, this fluid-moving feral thing, this whirling personification of _fury_ who leaves only death and pain and anger in his wake.

Their vanished morale ought to elate him. He ought to cheer as they disperse and taunt their cowardice, but seeing them turn tail and try to escape him only makes him angrier, because Loki is _dying_ and it's their wretched faults and how _dare_ they try to escape their judgement for doing this to him?

So, everything else forgotten, he follows, and he _kills_, and even when they shoot at him over their shoulders he shrugs off the burning impacts like insect bites and doesn't so much as slow his single-minded pursuit.

When he smashes the final Chitauri's head to pulp, he notices how far from the portal, from Loki, he has strayed. Too far, too far—

A sudden impact jars all the thoughts out of him, and for several seconds he is just confused, terribly confused by what's happening and why he's hurtling backwards through the air and—

When he hits the ground, a great cloud of dust goes up around him, Mjölnir goes skittering away across the grey rocks, and all the air bursts out of his lungs.

_Reinforcements_.

Even if he had wanted to, he can linger here no longer.

It's a hovercraft that smashed into him and drove him backwards, and it's done him a favour, knocking him so far back that he lies sprawled within easy distance of Loki and the way home.

He takes a second, just a second, to fill his lungs with air and assess how best to finish this. Then he's on his feet and running, reaching out for Mjölnir with one hand and Loki with the other. Just as the hammer slams back into his hand, he slides to a stop beside his brother and lifts him out of the dust, carefully as he can with hovercrafts bearing down from every direction.

Loki doesn't so much as stir, only leans limp and unresponsive back in Thor's arm, head back, mouth slightly open. Thor looks at his pale, pale face and feels all the anger go out of him in a rush that leaves him feeling _desolate_.

"Don't… Loki…" he murmurs.

Asgard is his brother's last hope. Thor swings Mjölnir and lets the hammer carry them to the portal, faster than the Chitauri's craft was built to travel. He leaves them all in the dust of their forsaken little spit of dust and earth, their purposelessly drifting speck of stellar flotsam.

—

As they crash down in familiar surroundings and the portal ceases to exist, Thor realises that it's not just the Chitauri he's left behind; the Tesseract, too, lies somewhere behind him in alien soil.

But that doesn't matter now. What matters now is Loki, the hands grabbing and trying to pull Thor away, the cacophony of voices, the vague golden blur that is Asgard. So many voices… it was just his mother here when he left but now it seems as though the entire household guard has found their way into the armoury, and all of them want Loki—but they can't have him, and none of the words they're shouting, the formless words that don't make sense, are going to change that.

One voice, however, stands out above the rest. _Odin_.

His voice carries clear and strong over all the others, and the hands clamouring at Thor stop at his command. The ringing silence that follows gives Thor the space he needs to realise that he is clinging to Loki with desperate, foolish ferocity, as if he believes his encircling arms are the only thing keeping Loki alive. Quite the contrary, he knows; he's only a hindrance.

But if Loki dies…

"Thor," Odin says, and another realisation—that his father has said his name several times, now—hits Thor. He looks up, mouth moving, not sure what he ought to say, whether he should apologise or— "We cannot help him if you will not let us."

He yields, suddenly too exhausted to hold on any longer, and lets the healers whisk Loki away to somewhere safe and peaceful and private.

—

Thor's injuries are minor, almost healed by the time Frigga tends to them in the quarters she shares with Odin, who watches with a face like thunder.

Pain burrows into his head, sits huge and malignant behind his eyes. It, along with the uncomfortable silence that's pregnant with accusation, makes him want nothing more than to flip the table and stalk out of the room.

He stays, though, and lets his mother wash the dust out of his wounds.

Of course, what he _should_ do is apologise. But every time he tries to, the words turn to dust in his mouth, because he's _not_ sorry, not really, and won't be—not _ever_—for as long as Loki lives and breathes.

A smile splits Frigga's face suddenly. Thor is surprised, because there's genuine mirth in her eyes… and how long has it been since she last laughed?

"What?" he asks, and he tries to sound cross but her smile is infectious and carries into the quality of his voice.

"Ask your father," she replies. Thor does so with a look.

"You suppose I am angry with you," the All-Father begins in that slow way of his, "for taking the Tesseract, against my explicit orders."

"I—" Thor begins, ready to defend himself and his mother, the choices they made because Odin is forever too blind in his old age to see that sometimes war cannot be averted—but his father cuts him off.

"I _am _angry," he admits, "but not, I think, for all the reasons you suspect."

"You are speaking in riddles, father. I haven't the patience—"

"I underestimated you, Thor. You know this enemy better than I. You know them better than any of us, except Loki… and I fear your brother will not be forthcoming with anything he knows of them."

"No," Thor agrees.

"We will send a small force to retrieve the Tesseract," Odin goes on, voice weighted with the familiar heaviness that Thor came as a child to associate with being in trouble.

Thor expects to be told that he has the command. He is, after all, ranked among Asgard's finest warriors. Odin sees the expectation in his son's eyes and shakes his head.

"You disobeyed me, Thor. However good your intentions, once again you have put all of Asgard in danger. There will be no glory for you, my son, not this time. You are to be restricted to Asgard for the duration of this campaign, however long it may be."

Instinctively, Thor starts to argue… but the argument dies on his lips, because Asgard is where Loki is.

He belongs at his brother's side.


	10. Decode

This marks the second time that he has died only to awaken in unfamiliar darkness, but this time is different from the first. Whenever he swims up out of the feverish, frightening confusion of unconsciousness he wants to stay awake, wants to stay here where it's warm and he's safe and the air smell of home.

When he sleeps he feels cold. He feels like he's falling, and sometimes wakes up in the darkness tangled in sweaty sheets, panicked, horrified. It's on these occasions that he becomes aware of pain, but he can never remember or identify the source before the freezing darkness reaches out with skeletal arms to pull him back down.

There are times, too, when he awakens and everything is so _bright_, and familiar faces loom in the light wearing familiar expressions… Sif with her careful smile, scowling eyes betraying her mistrust; Volstagg, Fandral and Hogun making no effort to conceal their distaste for his magic, his _trickery_; Odin with such crushing disappointment in his eyes that Loki can't bear it… and Thor, Thor with that look on his face like some useless wounded thing, the look he wore in the seconds before Loki dropped him out of the Midgardian fortress—of terrible, final understanding, of betrayal.

Sometimes it gets too much and he screams, or thinks he does, and claws at his skin. The hands that hold him down are gentle, but for some reason that he cannot place he can't stand to be restrained so he fights until he's exhausted and sinks back into the grey.

—

When he wakes up, _really_ wakes up and is lucid enough to make sense of his surroundings, the memories all come bearing down at once and threaten to smother him. The sheets are thick cloth of gold and it seems all at once that their sheer weight conspires to crush him. He inhales a short, gasping breath and pushes them away—

"Loki?" a soft voice asks tentatively.

_Thor_. He freezes as Thor comes to stand at his bedside, then swallows thickly and meets his saviour's eyes… but only briefly. He busies himself with sitting, propping himself up against the mound of cushions behind him. Every part of him screams in protest, but he sets his teeth, grimaces and endures.

He's surprised to find that he resents Thor for saving him, for once again proving to all of Asgard that Loki is inadequate, _unworthy_ of their love.

"Thor," he acknowledges stiffly. He must look like a child, all petulant and pouting, staring as if fascinated by the pattern on his bedclothes in his dogged determination to look at _anything_ except Thor.

"How do you feel?" he asks eventually, and Loki glances sidelong at him, trying to gauge the exact nature of the question. Is he fishing for thanks? It is hardly in Thor's nature, after all, to do a good deed without expecting gushing praise.

"Sore," Loki replies at length. He laughs humourlessly and raises his eyebrows. Of course he feels sore.

"I am not surprised," Thor echoes Loki's unspoken thought. "The Chitauri… _mistreated_ you," he adds, choosing his words carefully. Loki scoffs. They did more than mistreat him. Thor reaches out to take Loki's hand, but he snatches it away as if he's been burned and that stupid, injured look flashes across his adoptive brother's face. It disappears almost immediately, but Loki catches it and feels a stab of remorse—which makes him angry. After everything, is he expected to lie here and be made to feel guilty? He _knows _that he is guilty, and he will not be so quick to fall at Thor's feet and beg forgiveness.

Pressing on as if nothing has happened, Thor sits—_perches_—on the edge of the bed. It's almost laughable to see him tiptoe around like he's walking on broken glass, all awkward and ungainly in his efforts to maintain a peaceful environment.

"Their leader is dead," he says, and Loki sighs through his nose, irritated. _Why not just tell me outright that you want my gratitude?_

"I think not," he replies with a faint sneer.

"I killed him with my own hands. I watched him die."

"No. The one you killed was not their leader."

"Who is, then?" Thor asks. Loki is faintly delighted to see his fists clench of their own accord, so keen to inflict suffering and death on the ones who sought to inflict the same on Loki.

"I know not," he's forced to admit. "I knew once, perhaps, but… no longer."

"I will find him—" Thor starts to promise, but Loki cuts him off with a sharp look.

"Oh Thor, how endearing it is to see you baying for blood, so eager to please… the faithful _hound _of Asgard."

He doesn't get the reaction he's expecting, the hurt, reproachful and ultimately _meek_ look. A dark expression crosses Thor's face instead, and he rises, goes to leave.

"Perhaps I should have let them cut that poisonous tongue of yours out," he suggests.

"I didn't _ask _you to save me," Loki spits as Thor opens the door. He turns and smirks, but Loki sees through the smile, sees that Thor takes no joy in this. His heart is hardened and it seems he has learned to strike hard with words as well as Mjölnir.

"No," he admits, "you didn't ask. You begged, on your _knees_. You might not have meant to, brother, but the first thing they robbed you of in that foul place was your dignity."

Loki looks away, trying to force his indifferent expression not to falter. For all he's suffered, his pride has endured the worst. To be reminded of his disgrace is to be brought low all over again.

"Get out," he says in a voice barely above a dangerous whisper. When no response comes, he looks up, prepared to shout… but Thor is already gone.

The room seems darker without him.


	11. Something Rotten

**A/N: **So I seem to have a bit of a block going on. I had to physically wrestle this chapter out. There's blood and ink everywhere! Here's hoping that writing some shameless smut will pull me out of this rut.

* * *

The second the door closes behind him Thor is confronted with a ball of guilt that settles in the pit of his stomach like lead. He buries his face in his hands and curses himself for a spiteful fool, drives his fist into the wall and wonders what exactly compels him to show such little regard for the fragile state of his brother's mind.

It should be the easiest thing in the world to go back and apologise, to patch this newest wound in their relationship before it festers into something worse… but Thor finds himself walking away angry, devastated, overwhelmed by how _wrong_ everything has gone.

—

It's several hours before he forces himself to return. He finds Sigyn, the healer, engaged in what seems to be a decidedly one-sided debate with Loki.

"You need to _bathe_," she's saying. "The poison affects your body's ability to heal, and it is still in your blood."

For all the response he gives, Loki had may as well be made of stone. He stares listlessly at the floor beside his bed, unmoving, not even deigning to look at Sigyn, barely even stirring to acknowledge Thor's return.

"If you will not keep those wounds clean they will putrefy."

She looks at Thor, despairing.

"I apologise for him, Sigyn," Thor says, saving her the discomfort of having to complain openly. "I will see to it that his wounds are cleaned," he promises, knowing that the healer, unlike himself, lacks the strength to force Loki into doing something he doesn't want to.

She smiles her gratitude, casts Loki a reproachful look that he misses in his sullenness, and goes to leave. She pauses briefly as she passes.

"Be patient with him. He only lashes out because…" she trails off. "Forgive me, I presume too much." She dips into a swift bow and disappears from the room before Thor can assure her that he prefers to be spoken to frankly, would rather know what her insights are than be left to fumble blindly with his own suppositions.

He sighs and looks across at Loki, who still has that vacant expression on his face, like his mind has wandered somewhere and left this staring, empty shell behind.

"Loki," he calls, crossing the short distance from door to bed. He raises his voice in the hopes it might startle a response from him, but nothing. "Your bath is drawn. Come. Or must I carry you?"

Loki turns sharply then, and fixes Thor with a look that says _How could you?_

The guilt comes back all at once and he wants nothing more than to wrap his arms around Loki and beg forgiveness—but no, no… there is plenty of room in _Thor_'s heart for forgiveness, but he suspects that Loki's has turned to stone and has no room for anything but hatred. He sits on the edge of the bed instead, tentatively touches Loki's hand, and isn't surprised when his brother snatches it away.

"I… am sorry, Loki. Brother. I spoke—"

"_I am not your brother_, _Thor._" He's said it before, but this time it cuts deeper and Thor feels a great, yawning emptiness in his chest. He takes moment to let it wash over him, to remind himself breaking down the walls around Loki's head and heart is going to take _time_.

"I spoke without thinking. I was unkind, but…"

"But _what_, Thor? What paltry excuse have you conjured up for—"

"You are not the only person here who has been _hurt_, Loki. You would do well to recall that you have sought to injure me with more than words in recent days. Truly you are _lost _if you expect me to forget all the ills you have wrought, the cruelty of which you have shown yourself capable."

"Cruelty," Loki repeats, with a short laugh and a scathing look. "Do not _presume _to talk to me of cruelty as though I am the only one guilty of it. You were the one who cast me into an _abyss_."

"You let _go_!" Thor insists, incredulous. Is Loki's memory of events so warped, he wonders, or is this the trickster in him, the mischief-maker, trying to make Thor doubt himself? Such lowly tricks won't work. Everything, _everything_ about that day is burned into his memory and will stay there in perfect, excruciating clarity until his dying breath. "With all of my heart I wanted to _save _you. I cursed myself nightly—curse myself _still_—for failing you, Loki."

Something flashes in Loki's eyes then, something brief and unreadable. Thor seizes the opportunity to catch both of his brother's hands in his own, to hold them, to force Loki to look at him, really _look_ and see the desperate sincerity in his eyes. There aren't many people for whom Thor will lay bare his soul. This twisted parody of Loki should not be one of them, but he is… he is.

"I love you, Loki," he says, struggling with his words, struggling to keep his brother from looking away. "I cannot bear it, to see you so embittered, to think that you doubt my love for you. I would do anything, I would bring down the skies for you." His eyes search Loki's face seeking a flicker of emotion, but all he sees there is the same passiveness as earlier, the same determination to give away nothing of his thoughts. "What would you have me do, Loki? What must I say to make you see that so many of the wrongs you suffered are imagined?"

That, Thor sees, was the wrong thing to say.

Loki's expression turns to a sickly smile as he leans in close, so close that his lips brush Thor's ear as he speaks.

"If you _truly_ loved me, Thor, now or ever," he begins, and his voice has taken on that soft, cold quality that seems to be fast becoming the norm for him, "you would not have stood between my army and Midgard; you would not have denied me my kingdom."

Thor recoils, with something akin to disgust on his face.

"You would stoop to such lowly blows?" he demands, infuriated by the smug expression on Loki's face—so satisfied, like a child who thinks he's going to get what he wants now that he's spat 'You don't love me!' like poison. "What joy do you take from this?"

"There is no joy for me, _brother_," Loki says, with a sneer that leaves Thor under no illusions that his use of the word 'brother' was anything but derisive. "I speak only truths. I do only what I must."

Thor has had enough of this backwards conversation, of talking in circles that begin and end with Loki's misguided need to lash out. He rises.

"Your bath, Loki," he says stiffly. "You _must_."

Loki rolls his eyes, but pushes back the sheets and struggles out of his bed. Thor wants to go to him, to help, but he just can't… at least, not until Loki's knees buckle and he falls, and then Thor steps forwards without even thinking, catches him, holds him, and for one perfect second Loki lets himself rest in Thor's arms—like old times.

And then the moment is gone, and Loki pushes himself away, surprisingly gentle, not meeting Thor's eyes.

Still, Thor thinks he glimpses gratitude there. That's not what he wants, though. Not really. What he wants is to break Loki down completely, to have him on his knees in supplication, begging for the forgiveness that Thor would so easily give if only Loki would _ask._


	12. Roses

**A/N: **So it's been a long old time since I last wrote anything so, uh… _dirty_. I hope it meets the approval of all the smut-connoisseurs out there. Also, this chapter is completely unnecessary. I pretty much wrote it _just _for the sake of shaking off the cobwebs. xD

* * *

The bath is, strictly speaking, more like a pool. It dominates the whole room and the light of a thousand candles reflects off the glassy surface. Stepping into the waist-deep water is like stepping into molten gold. It's so hot, _too_ hot, really, but Loki steps in and descends the stairs and submerges himself to the neck. There's incense burning in braziers around the water's edge and the room is full of steam and smoke. It's nice, takes his mind off the way his back feels suddenly like he's fallen into a bed of needles.

Loki drifts to the far side of the pool, letting the water burn him clean. It's a good pain, one that he can control, stop if it gets too much. When he reaches the water's edge he raises his arms out of the pool and folds them neatly out of the water, resting his head on them as the warmth envelops him. The bruises around his wrists have healed, finally, but the slash across his cheek and jaw stings abysmally when it touches his damp arms, so he turns his head and shuts his eyes and waits until it doesn't hurt so much to be submerged.

When he hears the sound of gentle splashing somewhere behind him, he knows it's Thor and is faintly surprised—but not unpleasantly so—that he's here.

He doesn't say anything, or stir, only leans against the edge of the pool and waits. The only sound he makes is a sharp intake of breath as Thor sinks into the water behind him and brushes the barest trace of a kiss against the back of his neck.

"This isn't washing," he points out in a low voice, and Loki is glad he says that rather than trying to continue their earlier conversation.

"Will this not suffice?" Loki asks, raising his head and half-turning to look at Thor out of the corner of his eye.

"I think not. The healer's instructions were to _wash_," Thor replies, "not luxuriate." His fingers are gentle against Loki's back, tracing across the half a hundred deep and slow-healing wounds there. "I am… sorry. That this happened to you."

"I know," Loki says, resting his chin on his folded arms. He senses there is more to what Thor is saying. He is sorry that the Chitauri caught him, yes, but he is also sorry for letting him fall so far in the first place. It's not enough. He doesn't want apologies, and he doesn't want forgiveness. He wants what he is owed, what is his by rights, wants Asgard, Jotunheim, _anything_.

For now, he is content to have Thor… but _only _for now. Without a kingdom, without tangible proof of his worth, how will he ever atone for being what he is, not a man—not a god—but a monster built on a foundation of lies and deceit?

"Let me help you," Thor goes on, speaking softly, and maybe there's more to _that _statement as well, but for all his asininity Thor is sensible enough not to press, to instead reach for one of the cloths folded into a neat pile above the water, to soak it and _scrub_, trying to be gentle, failing.

His are, after all, warrior's hands, made for swords and hammers, made with destruction in mind. His ministrations are well-meaning but Loki arches away from them despite himself, hands half-curling into loose fists, hissing like some injured animal—but Thor has him pinned there between himself and the edge of the water, and one hand firmly on his shoulder to keep him from rising.

"Thor, please—you're _hurting_—"

Next thing he knows Thor has him turned around, on his feet, in his arms, and Loki's tongue seeks the moist warmth of Thor's mouth almost of its own volition. He finds it, and Thor is more than willing to oblige, crushing Loki against him with one hand, seeking the growing hardness between them with the other.

"_Yesssss_," Loki purrs as Thor's hand finds his stiffening manhood and _strokes_, gentle at first, then faster, harder. He buries his face in the crook of Thor's neck, bares his teeth, bites the tender flesh there, and Thor responds with a hiss that's mostly pain… but not _entirely._

He finds himself turned again, with hands curling into his hair—and a sudden shove forces the wounded side of his face down against the slick, cold surface of the tiles around the edge of the pool. He struggles to push away, but Thor is too strong for him, always has been, and all he can do is push against the tiles with all his strength just to keep his face bare millimetres off the ground.

The hot press of Thor's erection is, he's suddenly aware, there against his leg, sliding up between them, and he has just enough time to choke out, "_Don't—_" before Thor is inside him and pain flashes in front of his eyes like so much lightning. It lasts one measured thrust, two, three, and then it doesn't matter and Loki rises against Thor to meet his every stroke, and there they are bucking against one another like desperate animals in heat, and the pain in Loki's side where the Chitauri stuck a knife in him spreads through him but he doesn't _care_—because all that matters is this, the coarseness of Thor's pubic hair against the tops of his legs, the ungentle hand wrapped half-forgotten around his cock, the feeling of perfect _fullness_.

When he comes he does so gracelessly, moaning into the marble beneath his face, pressing himself back against Thor as if his life depends on it, gasping "_Don't stop_," over and over like a mantra until he's spent, utterly, and Thor follows him over the edge, pulling his hair so hard it _hurts_, saying his name, hips bucking without rhythm against Loki, filling him with sticky warmth.

The second the grip on his hair loosens he slides away, sinking down neck-deep into the water and turning to look up at Thor. There's blood in the water where Loki's wounds have reopened, and Thor watches it spread with guilt written across his flushed face.

Loki spares him a smile, pulls him down into the water with him, presses a hard, passionless kiss against his lips.

"Are we quite done here?" Loki asks, and Thor looks confused, like he doesn't understand what's just happened, isn't sure whether he should feel guilty or used.

Honestly, Loki doesn't know which it is, either.

He rises from the pool, sore and bloody and _tired_, and leaves before he has to confront the question.


End file.
